A Sheikh To Capture Her Heart

Damn it all, how did he usually get a woman into bed? He must have some technique—some idea of how to get from a shared lunch to the bedroom!

She was smiling, probably at the confusion that must be evident on his face.

Had she really just suggested they have an affair—well, hardly an affair, surely they took longer …?

I wouldn’t mind one. She’d definitely said that.

Put the words right out there in the open, in a cartoon bubble above her head!

Well, the man was the most handsome, sexy member of the species she’d ever met, and if you counted tingling nerves, and a racing pulse, and shallow breathing, then he was right about there being something between them.

But an affair?

Well, hardly that, a fling.

A very short fling …

What the hell!

She looked into those slumberous grey eyes, studied the moulded lips, and, as panic yelled at her to go, to run for her life, she heard herself saying, ‘Well, what happens next?’

He looked so stunned, she helped him out.

‘Either I kiss you or you kiss me, I guess. Do you have a preference?’

He made a growling kind of noise and drew her close, studying her face, running his fingers through her hair, eyes wide now with a kind of wonder.

‘You’re serious?’

‘Well, I think I am, but the more you mess about the more worried I’m getting. Perhaps we should sleep on it, decide tomorrow.’

This time the growly noise was more like a purr.

‘And miss tonight? No way.’

Now, finally, he did kiss her.

Well, she guessed it was just a kiss, although it was unlike anything she’d ever experienced, sending her brain cells into a muzzy cloud and her body into a frenzy of desire.

Lust?

What the hell? Did it really matter?

She concentrated on the kiss, on kissing him with as much heat as he was kissing her.

Kissing him …

He felt her momentary hesitation, remembered her tears, and lifted his head, cupping her face in his hands, and looked into her eyes.

‘You’re sure about this?’

Well, nearly sure …

She didn’t say the words but he read it in her eyes. Nearly sure wasn’t good enough—not this time, for some reason, not with this woman.

Though at other times would he have hesitated?

Hell, what did he know?

Except he wanted her to be sure, so he kissed her lightly on the lips and tried a smile, although he knew it probably looked as false as it felt.

‘Think about it,’ he said quietly.

She eased her body away from his and nodded.

‘I think I need to,’ she responded.

And with that, she stood up, thanked him politely for the lunch, and walked away.

Out of his bure, but not out of his life?

He had no idea …

CHAPTER THREE (#ulink_921c7d56-9c29-544f-b157-0886a7ad910e)

SARAH HEADED STRAIGHT for the rock fall. Sunset Beach was her sanctuary on this island and the sooner she got there the sooner she might be able to work out why she’d suddenly taken leave of her senses.

Calmly telling that man she wouldn’t mind an affair!

That was what she’d said, wasn’t it?

And from what part of her obviously impaired brain had those words sprung?

Although, remembering the heat of that one long kiss, she doubted her brain had had anything to do with it.

Even so …

She was clambering over the rocks now as the tide was in, but her mind raced to find an explanation for her behaviour.

Once on the beach she sat in the shade of the rocks—it was really far too early for her to be out here—and let the beauty of that special place calm her racing heart.

In the beginning, all she’d had room for in her heart and mind had been her grief, the grieving process isolating her from others, so she’d barely noticed that the sensual part of her nature had died along with David and her unborn child.

But seeing Rahman al-Taraq—Harry—again at the cocktail party had not only brought back memories of that dreadful day but, contrarily, had reawoken her senses. She’d been so startled by the unmistakable surge of attraction she’d felt towards him that she’d denied ever having met him and fled the party.

Yet, once reawoken and stirred, those parts of her that had lain dormant would no longer be denied, and over the following weeks she’d dreamt, at times, not particularly of Harry but of the pleasant, teasing sex she’d shared with David, although sometimes in the dreams he wasn’t David, and sometimes in the dreams she’d wanted more …

She shook her head, sighed, and stared out at the translucent water that ran over the reef through the lagoon and splashed on the beach near her feet.